Do you know of the deep, dark secrets beneath one of Guildford's most recognisable town centre landmarks?

Excavation of the Friary site started in 1974 when members of the Surrey Archaeological Society carried out a dig to try to find out more about the Dominican Friary, which was known to have been there in mediaeval times.

The results were document in a string of remarkable images, and we've delved deep into the Surrey Advertiser archive to bring them to you.

In 1978, during the lengthy dig, field officer and director of the excavations Robert Poulton wrote an article to inform our readers about the society's discoveries, and to give an idea of the lifestyle of the monks who lived there from approximately 1275 until the friary's dissolution in 1538.

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Hence, in 1973, Felix Holling, then curator of Guildford Museum, excavated two small trial trenches on the site.

The results from these were sufficiently encouraging to lead to two major excavations, the first in 1974 by directed by Humphrey Woods, and the second in 1978, directed by Robert Poulton himself.

These excavations revealed an almost complete plan of the friary. The Dominican order of Friars was founded in Italy in the early 13th century and their first house established in England, at Oxford, in 1221.

Most of the burials found on site were undoubtedly of lay people as none of them had any religious artefacts on their person to indicate that they were priests. Altogether, some 65 graves were excavated.

Of these, 28 were in the nave of the church and 37 in the cemetery itself. A Victorian mansion previously built on the site before the brewery had greatly affected the friary's cemetery during its construction.

It appeared there had been a conscious effort to clear the cemetery at this time, to make way for the mansion gardens.

Grisly testimony to this clearing process was found in two pits at the south end of the site.

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These were filled with human legs, arms and skulls, but scarcely any other bones.

Clearly the other, more easily crushed, bones had been simply trampled back in to the ground. A group of five individuals buried in another grave may well have been plague victims.

The bodies of a mother and her child were found buried in another area. The bodies found within the nave were in a far better condition though as the ground has not been disturbed during the creation of the Victorian mansion.

All but one of the bodies were found in wooden coffins, of which only the nails survived.

The exception was the body of a young woman, who have been buried wrapped in a Shroud of fine linen, and placed in a lead lined coffin within a well of mortared chalk blocks.

Two digs were carried out, one in 1974 and the other in 1978 (Image: Surrey Advertiser)

She was clearly a person of considerable wealth and importance, but alas her name does not survive. At the time of excavation, the site represented the most complete plan of any Dominican friary in England.

The skeletons were taken to the Ancient Monuments Laboratory in London where they were the subject of detailed research. Then, at the end of September 1987, it was at last time for them to be reinterred.

They were laid to rest in the churchyard of St Mary's Church in Guildford, which was opened specially after an order in council was granted by the Queen.

The site was once a Dominican Friary, and skeletal remains were discovered (Image: Surrey Advertiser)

Among those in attendance were the mayor and mayoress of Guildford Andrew Hodges and Barbara Pattman, chief executive of Guildford Borough Council David Watts, the Vice Lord Lieutenant of Surrey Major James More-Molyneux, and Chief Superintendent David Stuart.

The service took the form a sung Eucharist, which was celebrated by the Bishop of Dorking the Rt Rev David Wilcox.